The King and the Pirates
Posted on 04. Dec, 2009 by Les in Artistic Takes
Ten Pirates invade a King’s ship. They beat and rape the King’s entire family, and begin pillaging all the goods.
The King arrives in his rowboat, and from the water can see what’s going on. He shouts to the pirates, “Stop now, and I will be merciful to you, and forgive you!” (desire for all to repent, and not to die in sins).
The Pirates bring out his family and rape and murder them on the deck, while laughing at the King. As they get drunk on the wine from the ship they do even more perverse things with the bodies all while the King watches in horror, and rage. They yell insults and taunts at the King and light the sails on fire. The ship begins to go up in flames.
In their drunkenness they pass out, fall overboard into the water and begin to drown. The King yells to their unconscious bodies “Climb into my boat, if you want to live!” (universal call to spiritually dead people who can’t and won’t respond [dead in sins and tresspasses]).
The King is moved in his love and decides, in order to show how merciful he is, to save three of the pirates. He could have saved all ten, but rightfully decrees that the others will die for their sins. He pulls the chosen three from the water, moments before they die, and gives them CPR. All three are revived (regeneration).
When the pirates come to, the King commands them to repent and bow before him as Lord (Inward call to the elect). All three wretchedly guilty pirates realize what they’ve done, and how the King saved them, and they begin to weep. They wail with tears and express how sorry they are, and how they now know what a great King he is. They then request to become his slaves (faith and repentance). He forgives them completely, takes the boat to his castle, adopts the pirates, and makes them all princes. They are forever changed by his mercy, and from that day forward they rule with him in righteousness.
When you see the severity of man’s sinfulness you can no longer ask “Why didn’t the King save all ten pirates?”.
When you see men for what they truly are, that question is completely eclipsed by “How could a righteous, angry King give such amazing grace to the three?”.
Matt Hartzell
Dec 4th, 2009
I like it! We need more of this. You need to write an illustrated childrens book!
Les
Dec 4th, 2009
haha, thanks man. I’m not sure you can talk about rape and murder in a children’s book though…
Although I do read the Bible to my 2 year old, and it’s all in there.
K. Tanner
Dec 11th, 2009
Kinda like the castle story by James White.
Les
Dec 11th, 2009
Totally. This was a response to someone who was saying that Calvinistic universal/effectual calling is like 10 people falling overboard and the ship crew throwing a rope to 2 people but telling them all to swim in. So I responded with Dr. White’s improvements on Geisler’s farmer analogy.
We need to make the poor little mistake-makers into unbelievably wretched sinners. We need those sins to be against someone of immense value, who actually has reason to have wrath…. even then errors abound, but we’re getting closer to the truth.
A. Davis
Dec 11th, 2009
I don’t think the issue here is whether or not the king could have saved all ten or even, necessarily, how sinful the ten are. I think the question that’s begged here is “why did he choose those three and not all ten”? He easily could’ve chosen all ten or none at all. So why three?
And herein lies the dispute between Calvinist doctrine and non-Calvinistic doctrine. The Calvinist presents a universal call, but only a limited atonement (which seems sort of pointless to the non-Calvinist). Why have a call to those for whom there is no redemption? Why are all men told to repent and believe if only a few (the elect) are to be saved? The non-Calvinist doctrine would say there’s a universal call AND a universal atonement, but that the atonement is only imparted when one chooses to believe; thus the atonement is still limited in application, but its limit is based on man’s choice. Just as Adam chose to sin and Joshua chose to serve God (Josh 24:15), so God calls man to choose (no where in Scripture does it say that man used to have choice [ie: the Garden, Joshua 24:15], but that suddenly God decided to change how He dealt with man and do everything for him).
We can attempt to make the “poor little mistake makers” instead into murdering, raping, pillaging pirates all we want. But the issue here isn’t necessarily the degree of their sin (for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God), but of God’s love for mankind. Truly, if all have sinned, then that means the person who actually lived a pretty good life and who only ever sinned once by lying is just as much a sinner as the murdering, raping pirate. Both are need of redemption, no matter what their crime (sin).
So based on the idea that *all* men are sinners, tell your same story, but everytime you describe their sin, substitute the phrase “they told a little white lie”. So now all they’ve done is to tell a “little white lie” and when the king pulls out only three instead of all ten (even though he could’ve pulled out all ten), now he looks like a racist, heartless jerk.
Let’s change the story slightly. Instead of passing out, after each telling one lie, they all just fall into the water and the king throws a lifeline to each of them. Three grab the lines and are pulled to safety. Seven say “we don’t want your help… we’ll swim for it” and are dashed and bloodied on a coral reef and eaten by sharks and die. To the three, the king says “now that I’ve saved you, I’m going to sanctify you and have you be princes of equal status with my son”. Now we have something a bit more like the Gospel and representative of John 3:16.
The issue here seems to be that you want to focus on mankind’s sin and degrees of depravity to show how merciful and gracious God is, but you do so to explain away those that are seemingly lost without the hope of salvation. This is similar to a magician doing a slight of hand trick… get the person to watch the action in the left hand, while making a change with the unseen right hand). The reality is, the focus is not on our sin or the degree of our depravity… the focus is on JESUS and HIS shed BLOOD on the CROSS for ALL SIN… for whether we tell one little white lie in our lifetime or we rape and murder the innocent, we are still sinners in need of a savior. Jesus himself said that He came to “seek and save the lost”. We (liars and murdering, rapists alike) are the lost that He came to seek and save.
Les
Dec 11th, 2009
First of all the sin issue is VERY important. I’m not saying that we all murderers and rapists in reality, obviously we’re not.
The point of this story is spiritual allegory. You’re right, the person who told the white lie is just as guilty. So the spiritual representation of your little white liar is the murdering raping pirate on the spiritual level.
It’s direct contrast to those poor boys who went swimming when they knew they shouldn’t or the people who fell overboard and wanted to swim back on their own. It’s dishonest about how sinful our sin is. We are so incredibly guilty that a patient loving God will punish us FOREVER in conscious torment… It’s not for swimming in the wrong place. I’m trying to demonstrate the severity of sin.
It’s VERY important, because it shows how little we deserve mercy.
Issues with Election (Reformed teaching) « Pages of a Dale Roberts Journal
May 8th, 2010
[...] damned because of it. Listen to this story that I heard today, It isn’t my own! It was on KillerRobotNinja’s blog. (Is it just me, or should I really not take my doctrine from somebody with such a crazy nick [...]
The King and the Pirates « Gay and Evangelical
May 11th, 2010
[...] Read the rest of the story here. [...]
Paul
May 12th, 2010
I think this story is a good illustration of the *election* aspect of salvation. It’s a flawed analogy though, in the sense that we are DEAD in sin and in need of resurrection, not unconscious in need of reviving.
Still, I like it. It’s a really good portrayal of the total depravity of man. It also shows man’s lack of ability to choose God because of his blind, sinful nature.
Les
May 12th, 2010
lol, thanks Paul.
I guess I could have made the Pirates die, and need an actual resurrection… but then the King is literally God, and it’s not really an analogy anymore. lol.
Thanks for the encouraging words all. Praise God for His electing love!
Paul
May 17th, 2010
Thanks for your gracious words, Les! lol yeah I definitely see your point. The story DOES have to be humanly possible, so even if most of the points are analogous, inevitably it will somehow be flawed in one or two aspects.
And totally agreed; Soli Deo Gloria!
Les
May 17th, 2010
very nicely put.
The biggest flaw, in my eyes, is the lack of a substitution. It almost renders the story unchristian. But for the task of showing the fairness/unfairness of election, I think it does an ok job. idk.
Eren Mckay
Aug 27th, 2010
It’s kind of hard for me to like this story as the description of rape and murder really churn my stomach. I understand the message though. The message is good.
All the best,
Eren
Les
Aug 27th, 2010
Yeah. I appreciate what you’re saying. I guess I’m going for shock value to shake the Christian of the idea that we’re all these poor little mistake makers that need a little help.
Does it cross the line? I’m not sure.